Comedy Follows Familiar Formula

MOVIE REVIEW - (Two stars)

March 29, 1993|By CANDICE RUSSELL, Film Writer

Men are swine, women are better. This premise fuels a middling comedy about twentysomething romance called The Opposite Sex -- And How to Live With Them.

No great insights or brilliant comic performances lie within this 85-minute film. Attempting desperately to be cute, it sidesteps the issues of sexual incompatibility and fear of commitment that get one couple in trouble.

Director Matthew Meshekoff uses the talk-straight-to-the-camera technique found in When Harry Met Sally.... It allows the characters to muse on their halting relationship and gives their best friends a chance to comment, criticize and obsess.

David Crown (Arye Gross) is a typical guy`s guy -- an ogler of women and a sports nut who drinks too much in bars on dateless weekends. Best pal Eli (Kevin Pollak from A Few Good Men) is even worse. His attitudes toward women are summed up in a trio of ``F`` words, the first two being ``film`` and ``food`` as a means to the third (which you can guess).

Like leads to love, love leads to live-in, live-in leads to: What are we doing together? Eli, a smug bachelor who misses his drinking buddy, roots for a breakup. When it happens, he stops short of throwing a keg party in celebration.

It matters little, apparently, that she isn`t a Jew (he is) or that he has greater needs in bed than she wants to satisfy. While the screenplay by Noah Stern is true to the plausible divisions that keep men and women apart, whatever their age, it is merrily dismissive of these problems. In that regard, the film is closer to the musical I Do, I Do than the recent film He Said, She Said.

A few scenes stand out. When Eli questions the couple about their breakup, he assumes the voice of Ted Koppel anchoring Nightline. As Carrie struggles through a first meeting with David`s parents, her nightmarish imagination of the event becomes part thriller, part inquisition with the sirens blowing.

Passable, light entertainment, The Opposite Sex is a 2-year-old film only now being shown in local theaters. Perhaps it stayed on a shelf because it is too much like other romantic comedies.

THE OPPOSITE SEX -- AND HOW TO LIVE WITH THEM

A young man and woman in love have trouble deciding whether to make the ultimate commitment.